


A Nice Day

by jessaverant



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: F/F, Gen, Lapidot Angst Week, Pearlmethyst week, Prompt: Shattered, Sad Ending, Shattered/Shattering, Shattering Headcanons, everyone suffers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-16
Updated: 2018-02-16
Packaged: 2019-03-19 07:59:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13700253
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jessaverant/pseuds/jessaverant
Summary: It was supposed to be a nice day.Amethyst, Peridot and Steven go to tend their growing garden on a beautiful day in early summer. The plan was to leave early in the morning, spend the day working, and be back to the beach house in time for lunch.They weren't home for lunch.(For the shattering/shattered prompt for Lapidot Angst Week and for the angst prompt for Pearlmethyst Week.)





	A Nice Day

It was _supposed_ to be a nice day.

Steven, Peridot and Amethyst had left the Temple early, just after sunrise, to spend some time in their garden. They’d found a plot one town over, on a small farm that rented out the plots for communal use. After some cajoling from Greg, they’d secured three consecutive plots, and started planting all sorts of things. Peridot focused her efforts on small fruits and vegetables she could handle; tomatoes, cucumbers, strawberries. Amethyst planted geraniums, morning glories and sweet peas. Steven planted so many sunflowers they leaned over into the emptied plots surrounding his.

It was beautiful.

It was going to be a beautiful day. It _was_ a beautiful day. The sun was high, the sky was deep blue, and Peridot felt good. The sun on her form was comforting and warm and the air was sweet from their planting. They were far from the farm, over near the edge of the woods, far from the roads and far from people. It was mostly quiet with the occasional quip from Steven or Amethyst, with interruptions from birdsong and buzzing. The knot that was permanently lodged in Peridot’s nonexistent stomach was finally, _finally_ beginning to unravel and fade away. Peridot had stopped mid-dig, sat back on her haunches, and stared upwards at the sky, trying to preserve this feeling in her mind’s eye for eternity. That was hours ago, now.

When she finally came to, she was staring at the sky again, but it was for a vastly different reason.

“Per?” Peridot turned her head to the right, vision unfocused and dark. The pain that had irked her back to consciousness had dulled to an afterthought, and as she stared ahead, her vision cleared.

Amethyst was lying beside her, upside-down from her vision, staring straight up at the sky. She was scuffed all over and thick, black lines were snaking across her form at an alarming rate. She was panting, trying to gulp in air as if she were drowning.

“Yeah?” Peridot croaked, and winced at the sound of her own voice. Amethyst turned her head to face the other Gem, her lavender mane pillowing her face. She blew her hair out of her eyes and grinned eerily at Peridot. One of her eyes was bulging and black.

“How bad is it?” Amethyst asked, licking her dry lips. Peridot groaned and struggled to focus on Amethyst’s gem, partially covered by her top.

“I can’t tell,” Peridot said. She tried to move her right arm but found she was unable to do so; it was just as well, she supposed. “What about me?” Amethyst squinted, her black eye rolling uselessly.

“Bad,” she said. “But whole, at least.”

“Are you not whole?” Peridot asked, and Amethyst shifted so her torso fully turned to face her friend. Peridot let her jaw drop as Amethysts gem came into view. It had a large chunk missing out of the center, and the rest of it was cracked so deep she swore she could see Amethyst’s form from the other side.

“D-does it hurt?” Peridot stammered, not wanting to think about how bad her own crack must be. Cracks. _Hundreds of thousands of cracks._ Amethyst shook her head and flopped back down, her form shivering into translucence before solidifying again.

“No. I always thought it would, heh.”

“That… _thing_ got you good,” Peridot said, the memory flashing before her eyes. “D’you think we poofed it?” Amethyst snorted as she turned back up towards the sky.

“Nah. We ran into that monster like, a hundred years ago and it put up on _hell_ of a fight then… We decided not to go after it. Definitely a—“ Amethyst cut herself off as her form glitched again, this time swapping her hands for her feet before immediately swapping back. Amethyst appeared, gritting her teeth, eyes squeezed shut.

“Ugh,” she said after a moment of silence. “I’m concentrating so _hard_ on staying like this. I don’t wanna die a glitchy _mess_!” She yelled the last word into the early afternoon sun. Peridot said nothing, just watched as tears formed in the corner of Amethyst’s eyes. _Tears. Healing._

_Steven._

“Amethyst!” Peridot cried, finally forcing some life into one of her arms. “Where’s Steven? H-he can heal us, right?” Amethyst opened her eyes, struggling to turn back towards Peridot.

“I don’t know!” she exclaimed, and panic struck her expression. “I woke up just before _you_ did!” Amethyst flipped over to her other side and slowly pushed herself half-way into a sitting position, where she let out a loud, tortured gasp. “ _STEVEN!_ ” she shrieked, the force of her scream so taxing on her form she glitched again.

“What?!” Peridot said, somehow drumming up enough energy to turn onto her side. She strained her neck as far as it would go and finally saw.

Steven was lying several feet from them, face down in the dirt. His arms were extended up over his face, covered in scratches of varying sizes. His clothes were torn and he was covered in mud and whatever was left of their plants from the attack. She could see he was breathing, but the breaths were shallow and staggered, and dark liquid was seeping through his shirt.

“We gotta get him help,” Amethyst said, before falling onto her back once more. She wheezed and sighed, glitching violently. “He’s gotta—gotta be okay.”

“What _is_ that?” Peridot asked, before allowing herself to fall back down as well. Amethyst chuckled darkly.

“ _Blood,_ ” she said. “It’s a very important human thing. They’re not supposed to lose a lot of it.” Amethyst swallowed thickly and said nothing else. Peridot stared back up at the sky, mind racing with thoughts of Steven.

_Steven can’t die. Steven can’t die. Steven can’t be shattered. If I have to die, he lives._ She knew that the killing blow came from a very precise point on the monster’s elbow, almost as if it had been designed to shatter. It was aiming for Steven, who had been knocked out, but Peridot took the brunt of it. She hadn’t even spared a second thought to what she had done.

_Lapis would never forgive me if I let anything happen to Steven._ Peridot let out a soft gasp at the thought.

“Lapis,” she mumbled.

“Hrm?” Amethyst said from beside her. Peridot turned to face Amethyst, whose body was steadily becoming darker and darker. The black lines over her form were cutting deeper into her, and the edges of her form began to blur. Amethyst was lying on her side with her arms in front of her, fingers laced, staring straight ahead. Her other eye was slowly turning black as well, and dark tears stained her cheeks.

“Sorry, Per,” she managed to say through a choked sob. “I-I think I’m about to leave you all alone.”

“No,” Peridot mumbled, struggling to sit up once more. “You _can’t_.” Amethyst pursed her lips and gave her head the tiniest shake, shoulders trembling through her tears. The cracks in her gem started to cut even deeper, another small chunk popping out like a cork from a bottle.

“Peridot,” Amethyst pleaded, voice hoarse. “You gotta do something f-for me. _Please._ ” Peridot laid in silence for a moment, the finality in Amethyst’s tone hitting her like bricks. _This is really happening. Amethyst is going to shatter._

“…anything, my friend,” Peridot responded. She was surprised by how gentle her voice sounded as she spoke. The tears were coming in full force now, splashing into the earth that drank them up hungrily. Amethyst’s form shimmered dangerously, nearly blinking out of existence. Peridot turned herself over onto her right side, wincing as a sudden, sharp pain shot through her, originating from her gem. “Amethyst…?”

The Gem was still crying quietly, her silent sobs even more terrifying that if she were throwing a tantrum. Amethyst had dug her hands into the ground, as if she were holding the earth to herself. The sheer desperation of the act made Peridot’s chest ache.

“You gotta… tell Pearl something… from me,” Amethyst said finally, each word a laboring effort as she spoke. Her energy was quickly draining, and the dark lines were slowly splitting her form into dozens of smaller pieces. It was horrifying and captivating to watch all at once.

“What?” Peridot asked. She reached up and removed her cracked visor, the one thin layer of protection she’d had. The monster had pierced straight through it without a second thought. As she moved her hands, she noticed her own fingers were now black, and the same lines that covered Amethyst were moving along her own limbs. Peridot’s eyes widened in alarm as she dropped the visor, bringing both her hands into view.

_They were both going to die here, weren’t they?_

“Tell her… that I love… her,” Amethyst stammered, squeezing her eyes shut once more. The cracks in her gem were making audible sounds now, each _crsh crsh_ cutting through Peridot as painfully as her own injuries.

“Amethyst—”

“And… I’m… sorry.” Amethyst let out a breath and seemed to sag into the ground, hair near blinding white against her darkening form. The words were so _tender,_ so rare for someone like Amethyst, that Peridot wanted to bottle them up and preserve them for Pearl to hear on her own. Peridot sat in silence, wondering if that was the last she was going to hear from her friend. Something deep within her started to ache, altogether very different from the physical pain of her cracks.

“Sorry… for what?” Peridot asked after a time. She chuckled to herself. “What could you _possibly_ be sorry for?” Amethyst let out a wheeze that may have been a laugh.

“Sorry… for…” she trailed off, words dying on her lips. Peridot stared up at the sky, still cloudless, still beautiful.

Suddenly, Amethyst tugged one of her hands out of the dirt and reached out for Peridot, stretching her fingers as far as she could. Peridot turned and met her hand, fingers interlocking, and squeezed. Somewhere behind them, Steven let out a sigh and a grunt, but didn’t wake.

“Take care... of them.”

“I’ll do my best.”

\---

“Something’s wrong.”

Garnet was unsurprised to find Pearl standing at the temple door when she exited the Burning Room, hands clasped on her chest. She was hunched over, shoulders high, anxiety screaming from her pose. “I _know_ something is wrong, Garnet!”

“Hmm,” was all Garnet said in response, stepping over to the warp pad. She made a survey of the house and found it _was_ unusually dark and empty. The trio of gardeners were only supposed to be gone for a few hours, but it had been several since they left. Steven had only brought a small snack with him, as they had planned to be home for lunch.

“Garnet, _please,_ ” Pearl said, coming up beside her. “They were supposed to be back by now, and Steven isn’t picking up his phone. Can’t we go check on them?”

“Calm down, Pearl,” Garnet said, removing her glasses to meet Pearl’s worried gaze in what she _hoped_ was a reassuring expression. She placed a hand on Pearl’s shoulder and gave her a gentle squeeze. “We can go check on them.”

“Did you see anything?” Pearl asked as they made their way towards the warp pad, Garnet replacing her glasses. Garnet faltered as she walked, and Pearl clutched her arm tighter. “Garnet?”

“It’s hard to say,” she offered finally. Whatever bad feeling had taken Pearl had taken her as well, and she had the feeling she didn’t _want_ to look at what possibilities lay forward. “Let’s just get there as quickly as possible.”

They hadn’t gotten the chance to install a warp pad near to the garden, so part of their journey consisted of walking down a long, dirt road until they hit the farm. From there, it was nearly another mile until the plots came into view, with the last few lining the dense forest beyond. The closer they got, the more the air tensed around them, and the more dread poured into Pearl’s form. She walked clutched to Garnet’s arm, waiting as if something were following them in the woods.

_Something is not right at all._

“Do you see that?” Pearl squeaked suddenly as they stepped onto the plots. The first few were normal, owned by citizens of Beach City and other surrounding towns. But as they went further in, they began to see uprooted plants and produce. Entire strawberry bushes torn up, roots exposed, and tossed into other plots; trampled sunflowers, petals every which way; morning glory petals, bright violet against the dark earth.

“Oh _no,_ ” Pearl whispered, as they rounded the corner to where the furthest plots lay. “These are—“

“ _Steven,_ ” Garnet said in a harsh whisper, and broke into a run. Pearl released her and stopped in her tracks, trembling from head to toe. She could see, in the distance, two small forms lying down among the uprooted plants. Deep trenches were dug into the ground, scars against the earth from a mighty beast with long, deep claws. Garnet was kneeling in the muck beside one of the forms, small with a bright pink shirt and a bushel of dark curly hair.

_No._

“STEVEN!” Pearl screeched, reality slamming into her as she lurched forward, slipping in the mud. She skidded to a stop and fell to her knees beside Garnet, who had Steven curled up in her arms. His eyelids were dusky and his face was pale, too pale to be a good sign. He was dirty and covered in blood and breathing very slowly.

“He’s unconscious,” Garnet explained, looking around. She noticed Peridot lying several feet away, watching them with bleary eyes. Her form was covered in dark lines and her gem… Garnet’s eyes trailed to Peridot’s hands, where she was cupping something carefully.

It was only then that Garnet noticed Amethyst was nowhere to be seen.

_Wait… where’s—_

_We don’t have time to worry about that right now. We must get Steven to a hospital._

_But— Is she—_

_Ruby! We don’t have the time!_

“Pearl, I need you to take Steven,” Garnet declared, standing up. “The hospital Connie’s mother works at is close by. Let Greg know what’s happened once you arrive.” She glanced at Peridot and added, in a low voice, “I’ll stay here.” Pearl blinked, surprised, but gladly accepted Steven into her arms. She stroked his hair worriedly, rocking him without thinking.

“O-okay. Don’t worry, Steven, you’ll be alright,” she soothed as she raced off, going faster than Garnet had ever seen before.

With an ache in her chest and gritted teeth, Garnet went and sat beside Peridot, who was still lying in the mud. A slight breeze had picked up, bringing the scent of pine and maple with it from the woods just past them. It was warm and felt comfortable on her form as she settled into the thick mud.

_Sapphire, did you just See—_

_I did. I… I can’t believe it. Not until Peridot confirms it._

“Peridot,” Garnet muttered, reaching down and placing a hand on Peridot’s shoulder. She gave a tentative squeeze and then decided to do something she had not done in hundreds of years. “What happened?” she asked, removing her visor. Peridot coughed and turned onto her back, staring straight up into the sky again. A few wispy clouds had appeared as the sun began to set. Peridot grit her teeth and winced before speaking.

“Corrupted gem,” she said. “Big. _Mean._ Sharp. Had… lots of teeth. Amethyst… said you’d fought… it before.” The dying sunlight caught in the webs of cracks that were scattered across Peridot’s gem, looking almost pretty in its broken state. Peridot closed her eyes against her obvious pain, her hands clutched against her chest. Garnet sighed and bent down close to Peridot’s cheek.

“Are you in any pain?” she asked, as gently as she could. Peridot gave a stiff nod. “Too much pain to move? We could try going to Rose’s Fountain, if you think you can manage.” The visions in Garnet’s head danced; healing tears, fountain waters, possibilities of saving the Gem beside her.

Instead, Peridot shook her head, arms trembling. Garnet bit her lower lip and said nothing, instead giving Peridot a gentle squeeze as all the possible futures dwindled down to one. “I’ll stay here with you, then.”

It was supposed to be a nice day.

_Her shards are in Peridot’s hands, Ruby._

“Amethyst,” Garnet said finally, after giving Peridot a few moments of silence. Peridot could _feel_ the tremors in Garnet’s solid hand as she spoke. “You have her?”

“Here,” Peridot said, and with a painful gasp, drew her hands away from her chest and held them up to Garnet.

Shards. Dozens of violet-colored shards, refracting in whites and pinks and purples as the sun hit them from every angle. _Amethyst._ Garnet reached out and bubbled the shards Peridot’s hands, allowing it to float into hers, staring at the now red-tinted shards of her best friend.

_Amethyst._ Two hundred thousand thoughts rolled through Garnet at once; Ruby was furious, Sapphire was distraught, Garnet was… _hurt._ It was raw and biting and cut deep into her core in a way she hadn’t expected it to. They had lost so _many_ during the war that she’d become numb to it all.

_But we hadn’t known those Gems for thousands of years,_ something that wasn’t anyone else said from the back of her mind. _We didn’t live with them intimately for so, so long._ Something warm settled on her cheek, and Garnet lifted a hand to find a single tear snaking down her cheek from her right eye.

_We’re about to lose Peridot, too._

“I’m going to stay here with you, Peridot,” Garnet said before Peridot could ask. “Until it’s over.” Peridot said nothing, instead closing her mouth and staring at the shards resting at the bottom of the bubble.

“She… _we_ saved Steven,” Peridot managed to say. “Is he… okay?” Garnet gave a terse nod.

“Pearl has him. He’s safest with her.”

“ _Good,_ ” Peridot sighed heavily. She placed both her arms down beside her in the mud and stared upwards, eyes slowly turning black. The process was achingly slow, unnecessarily so, in Peridot’s opinion. Garnet crossed her legs and brought the bubble into her lap, one hand under it protectively. Her warm presence comforted Peridot, and she was glad that her last moments, if they couldn’t be shared with Lapis, were with Garnet instead.

_Lapis._

_She would be proud of me, for saving Steven like that. Even if it meant my shattering._ _She would have done the same in an instant._

_I would have done it for_ her _in an instant._

“G-Garnet,” Peridot stammered, still staring upwards. A bird flew by overhead, squawking into the forest. Garnet turned, her hand still solid on Peridot’s tiny shoulder. “I n-never told… Lapis that I…” she trailed off, her thoughts becoming more and jumbled, more and more twisted and confused. _Is this how Amethyst felt at the very end?_ She had tried to vocalize something before—before it happened, and those lost words would haunt Peridot until her own end. She swallowed and started again.

“I never… told her… what she meant… to me,” she said, struggling against the waves of confusion and hesitation storming through her mind. “And now…”

“I can… pass the message to her,” Garnet offered in a quiet voice. She had started rotating her thumb in soothing circles on Peridot’s shoulder, something she hadn’t realized she needed. “When she comes back to earth.”

“She’s… coming back,” Peridot agreed. She closed her eyes and let the sun wash over her. “She… has to.”

“Mm.” Silence followed. Almost time. How many times had she done this, sitting in the battlefield with those on their way out? How many Gems had she shepherded to death’s door? The strange sensation in her stomach deepened as she tightened her grip on Amethyst’s shards.

“Garnet?”

“Yes?”

“Ame…thyst… w-wanted to tell… Pearl… that she… loves her.” A staggered breath, breathed in not for lungs but for calm earth habit. “Will you… tell her… for me?” Another tear snaked down Garnet’s cheek, from her left eye, to match the steady stream on the right.

“…of course.”

\---

Steven was in critical condition.

Pearl was sitting in the emergency waiting room, on the floor against the wall, legs pulled up to her chest, waiting. Greg was in the room with Steven, reading him comforting stories as he slept. His gem was, miraculously, not damaged, and Pearl didn’t even want to _think_ about what would have happened if it had been. She secretly suspected the only reason he survived this long was due to his half-Gem physiology.

After several hours, Garnet arrived at the hospital as well, pushing past confused family members and nurses alike. She walked over to Pearl and sat down on the floor beside her, putting her arm around the smaller Gem and drawing her against her shoulder. Pearl didn’t change position, just remained with her arms around her knees, resting against Garnet’s shoulder instead of the wall behind her.

“He’s going to be okay,” Garnet said in a low voice. Pearly only nodded against her knees, a small feeling of relief washing over her. She knew Garnet wouldn’t share a vision such as that if it didn’t have a strong chance of being true. However, the relief she felt over Steven started to dissipate as the dark thoughts she had been battling for the last few hours came back.

Amethyst had been nowhere to be seen at the site of the fight, and Peridot…. She’d seen enough shattered Gems to know. Garnet said nothing else, just tightened her grip on Pearl’s shoulder, her own form trembling just slightly. Just enough to signal to Pearl something was wrong, wrong, _wrong._

“Peridot?” Pearl mumbled from within her own limbs. Garnet pursed her lips and nodded.

“Bubbled,” she said. “In the temple.” Pearl took a deep breath, lifting her head just slightly, fingertips digging into her knees for purchase.

“…Amethyst?”

Garnet sighed and removed her visor, all three of her eyes closing. She then turned to look at Pearl, opening just the bottom set, both focused on her big round ones as she waited for the news to drop into her lap.

“Yes. Also… bubbled. In the temple.” All sounds in the hospital faded; all thoughts vanished from her mind as her entire body began to tremble and Garnet tightened her hold.

_No, no, no, no, no…_

_Amethyst. Amethyst shattered. Amethyst is dead. And you didn’t even get to see her._ A tear trailed down her cheek, unnoticed by Pearl. Her mind flooded with images of Amethyst; Amethyst laughing, smiling, teasing her, shape-shifting to make her laugh, holding her when she cried, kissing her nose and her cheeks and her gem in the middle of the night…

Pearl was shaking her head. Garnet said nothing, just watching her sadly.

“A gem beast,” Pearl mumbled through her tremors. “Why, Garnet. Why didn’t we take care of it _before?_ ” Garnet said nothing, just watching the slight changes in Pearl’s face as the grief started to take its grip.

“Amethyst… gave Peridot a message that… she passed on to me,” Garnet started, but Pearl shook her head more violently, her tears flying from her cheeks as she pushed Garnet away.

“No,” she whispered, one hand over her eyes, the other digging into her knee. “No, no, I-I can’t _do_ this, _not again._ ” Amethyst’s playful, teasing smile from the morning was all she could see in her mind’s eye. “Garnet, I _can’t!_ ” she cried, before standing and running from the building, into the early evening, in the opposite direction of the temple.

Garnet remained, alone.

\---

Far away, at an unusually dark house, a blue Gem landed on the porch.

“Hello?” she called, shocked to see all the lights off so early in the evening. “Steven?” She peered into the window but couldn’t see anything moving within. Barefoot, she padded around to the door, which she was surprised to see was locked. She took a step back, hands on hips, frowning.

“Hello? Are the Crystal Gems home?” she called, to no answer. She spun on her heel and sat down on the porch, hands in her lap, staring up at the moon as it rose into the night sky.

“Well,” Lapis Lazuli said to no one, “I’ll just wait here. I’m sure they’ll be home soon, right?” She reached into her top and pulled out a folded piece of paper, with the word ‘Peridot’ written neatly on the front.

“They’ll probably be home soon, right?” Lapis said to herself, smiling down at her note. “And I’ll give this to Peridot, and we’ll talk, and it’ll be okay. Right?”

It had been, once upon a time, a nice day.

**Author's Note:**

> When I found out Pearlmethyst Week was the same week as Lapidot Angst Week, I knew I had to combine them somehow. I misread the Pearlmethyst Week schedule and thought "angst" day and "shattering/shattered" were on the same day, so I got a burst of inspiration for this story. I re-checked, realized they weren't, got sad, said "to hell with it" and did it anyway. So! This is for both weeks.


End file.
